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Sebastiano Ricci

The Exaltation of the True Cross, 1733

West Building, Main Floor — Gallery 30

Medium

oil on canvas

Dimensions

overall: 84 x 35 cm (33 1/16 x 13 3/4 in.)

Credit Line

Samuel H. Kress Collection

Accession Number

1939.1.72

Artists / Makers

Sebastiano Ricci (artist) Venetian, 1659 - 1734

Image Use

This image is in the public domain.
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Provenance

Count Grigory Stroganov [1829-1910], Rome.[1] (Count Alessandro Contini Bonacossi, Rome, 1927); purchased 1931 by the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, New York;[2] gift 1939 to NGA.

[1] According to National Gallery of Art, Preliminary Catalogue of Paintings and Sculpture, Washington, D.C., 1941: 169. This painting and its pendant (NGA 1939.1.71) do not appear in catalogues of Stroganov sales or in those of the collection, which include only selected works. According to Antonio Muñoz, La collezione Stroganoff, Rome, 1910, Stroganov amassed his collection c. 1880-1890 and bought many things from the sale of Cardinal Immenraet. It has not been possible to locate a catalogue of the Immenraet collection.

[2] The dates are given on the back of a photograph sent to the Frick Art Reference Library by Alessandro Contini Bonacossi at the NGA on 1 July 1969. The painting and its pendant are documented in the Kress collection in 1932 by Alfred M. Frankfurter, "Eighteenth Century Venice in a New York Collection", The Fine Arts 19 (December 1932): 30; see also The Kress Collection Digital Archive, https://kress.nga.gov/Detail/objects/2165.

Associated Names

Contini Bonacossi, Alessandro, Count
Kress Foundation, Samuel H.
Stroganoff, Grigory Sergeievich Count

Exhibition History

1929: Il Settecento italiano, Palazzo delle Biennale, Venice, 1929, no. 20.

1932: An Exhibition of Italian Paintings Lent by Mr. Samuel H. Kress of New York to Museums, Colleges, and Art Associations, travelling exhibition, 24 venues, 1932-1935, mostly unnumbered catalogues, p. 46 or p. 52, repro.

1938: Exhibition of Venetian Painting From the Fifteenth Century through the Eighteenth Century, California Palace of the Legion of Honor, San Francisco, 1938, no. 51, repro., as Saint Helen Finding the True Cross.

1938: Special Exhibition of Venetian Paintings from the Samuel H. Kress Collection, Seattle Art Museum; Portland Art Museum, Oregon; Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts, Alabama, August-October,1938, no catalogue.

1938: Tiepolo and His Contemporaries, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 1938, no. 3, repro., as Saint Helen Finding the True Cross.

1989: Sebastiano Ricci, Villa Manin di Passariano, Udine, 1989, no. 70 (cat. by Aldo Rizzi).

1994: The Glory of Venice: Art in the Eighteenth Century, Royal Academy of Arts, London; National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; Museo del Settecento Veneziano - Ca'Rezzonico, Venice, 1994-1995, no. 8, repro. (shown only in Venice in 1995).

2010: Sebastiano Ricci. Il trionfo dell'invenzione nel Settecento veneziano., Exhibition Facilities, Ex Convitto, Island of San Giorgio Maggiore, Venice, 2010, no. 27, repro.

Technical Summary

The support is a medium-fine, plain-weave fabric. The warm yellow-white ground has a rough, pebbled texture and is visible above the incised line that defines the arched top of the composition. The ground influences the overall tonality and texture of the surface design. The seraphim heads at the upper left are less finished than the others and are drawn with a darker brown than in the pendant. Otherwise, the painting technique is identical in the two sketches. X-radiographs reveal several pentimenti. The shadowy image of arms and a partial torso below the left arm of the cross suggests that the left angel was placed higher or that an additional angel was planned. The angel at the upper right originally gazed outward. The legs of the figure kneeling before the cross were shifted downward.

Cusping is present only along the right edge. Small, scattered losses are concentrated at the edges. The heaviest retouching occurs over areas of abrasion in the background sky. The varnish has darkened slightly. A file at the Frick Art Reference Library notes that the painting was relined in 1929. The Gallery's files report that Stephen Pichetto relined, removed discolored varnish, and restored the painting about 1931.

Bibliography

1932: Frankfurter, Alfred M. "Eighteenth Century Venice in a New York Collection." The Fine Arts 19 (December 1932): 30.

1941: Preliminary Catalogue of Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1941: 169, no. 183, as The Finding of the True Cross.

1942: Book of Illustrations. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1942: 243, repro. 177.

1950: Pallucchini, Rodolfo. "Giunte a Sebastiano Ricci." Proporzioni 3 (1950): 214.

1952: Palluchini, Rodolfo. "Studi Ricceschi I, Contributo a Sebastiano." Arte Veneta 6 (1952): 83.

1959: Paintings and Sculpture from the Samuel H. Kress Collection. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1959: 233, repro., as The Finding of the True Cross.

1960: Pallucchini 1960, 17, repro.

1965: Summary Catalogue of European Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1965: 114, as The Finding of the True Cross.

1966: Levey, Michael. Rococo to Revolution. New York, 1966: 32, fig. 15.

1968: National Gallery of Art. European Paintings and Sculpture, Illustrations. Washington, 1968: 102, repro., as The Finding of the True Cross.

1969: Daniels, Jeffery. "Sebastiano Ricci: The Last Phase." Apollo 90 (1969): 9, color pl. 3.

1972: Fredericksen, Burton B., and Federico Zeri. Census of Pre-Nineteenth Century Italian Paintings in North American Public Collections. Cambridge, Mass., 1972: 175.

1973: Shapley, Fern Rusk. Paintings from the Samuel H. Kress Collection: Italian Schools, XVI-XVIII Century. London, 1973: 128-129, fig. 256.

1975: European Paintings: An Illustrated Summary Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1975: 304, repro., as The Finding of the True Cross.

1976: Daniels, Jeffery. L'opera completa di Sebastiano Ricci. Milan, 1976: 137, no. 521, color pl. 63.

1976: Daniels, Jeffery. Sebastiano Ricci. Hove, 1976: 153, nos. 529-b, fig. 313.

1976: Martini, Egidio. "Due bozzetti di Sebastiano Ricci e alcune osservazioni sulla sua tecnica pittorica." In Atti del Congress internationzale di studi su Sebastiano Ricci e il suo tempo. Milan, 1976: 37.

1976: Pallucchini, Rodolfo. "Sebastiano Ricci e il rococò europeo." In Atti del Congresso internazionale di studi su Sebastiano Ricci e il suo tempo. Milan, 1976: 15-16.

1979: Shapley, Fern Rusk. Catalogue of the Italian Paintings. 2 vols. Washington, 1979: 1:398-400; 2:pl. 284.

1980: Fornari Schianchi, Lucia. In Arte e Pietà. I patrimoni culturali delle opere pie. Exh. cat. Museo Civico, Palazzo Pepoli Campogrande, and Conservatorio del Baraccano. Bologna, 1980: 328.

1985: European Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1985: 351, repro., as The Finding of the True Cross.

1987: Cirillo, Giuseppe, and Giovanni Godi. La Pinacoteca Stuard di Parma. Parma, 1987: 146.

1988: Tanzi, Marco. In Bozzetti, modelli e grisailles dal XVI al XVIII secolo. Exh. cat. Fondazione Lungarotti at Museo del Vino, Torgiano. Milan, 1988: 74.

1996: De Grazia, Diane, and Eric Garberson, with Edgar Peters Bowron, Peter M. Lukehart, and Mitchell Merling. Italian Paintings of the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries. The Collections of the National Gallery of Art Systematic Catalogue. Washington, D.C., 1996: 224-230, color repro. 227.